This week’s letter of the week comes from Mac Simon who takes aim at the recent city council shake-up. Thanks for the pointed letter, Mac. Stop by the Source headquarters to claim your winner’s spoils, a $20 gift certificate to Parrilla Grill. Tasty!
While you were sleeping – or celebrating, a ground-breaking, earth-shaking, life-changing election – or dancing as fast as you can to avoid foreclosure, the Bend City Council was seized by special interests. The kind that are probably not compatible with your interests in Bend’s livability. Steel yourself for the consequences.
Unbelievably, we lost two intelligent voices of reason – Peter Gramlich and Linda Johnson. Gramlich lost by a handful of votes to Tom Greene (really? pronounced green?), the frontman for the industry that intends to plunder and pillage what’s left of our natural landscape.
Johnson lost to Kathie Eckman. If you recall the Council’s history, she’s the bitter Republican who thinks running a city is as simple as a slash-and-burn weekend with QuickBooks. Her campaign was also funded by those who believe a crippled government is one less obstacle to unharnassed development of every square foot in Central Oregon.
You may have missed the endorsements of Greene and Eckman from our town Bully – often the first indicator of who has ties that bind. Bend’s Bully lives up to its cocky, smug reputation. You’ll find a lot of space in last Sunday’s paper giving the newly-elected a chance to huff and puff. Eckman insists that just because some builders’ association funded her campaign, doesn’t mean she shares its agenda. Of course not.
So, hello strip malls and condos pretending to be resorts and toxic industries. Goodbye public services.
God help Jim Clinton. With no special interest to serve, he will often be the only voice representing our community from a broader perspective.
Or maybe others will show up, stand up, speak up at City Council meetings. Maybe we learned something from the presidential campaign…something about coming together to regain the integrity and legitimacy of our country, counties and communities. One can at least hope.
Mac Simon, Bend
This article appears in Nov 6-12, 2008.
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Peter Gramlich and Linda Johnson probably lost to the ‘throw the bums out’ mentality that prevailed in this election. People who vote for these lower offices don’t spend much time researching their positions, records, etc. and as a result undervote or vote on a whim. A lot of people I know voted the ‘I can’t do worse’ ticket and the candidate without ‘incumbent’ attached to their name got the vote. Add to the fact that Bend is still a Republican town, and there you go.
Run next time yourself. It doesn’t take much to register as a candidate and there are adequate forums to get the message out there without expensive campaigning. If you’re not on the ‘right’ side of things, though, be prepared to lose.
Actually – I buy part of this. Yes – the incumbent toss is possible, but I put money and advertising at the top of the list of reasons for the ouster. This happens every eight years. COBA comes out and gives a shit about the election, runs a bunch of candidates on to the City, and then forgets about the positions for eight years and the true community representation comes back. As far as the “right” side being necessary to win – not anymore. Judy’s win is the beginning of the end of that mentality. The blue folk in Bend proper are going to have to start shrugging off their underdog mentality and get with the program. Good Dems are going to start winning more and more positions if they put forward better candidates. There is a demographic switch happening.
Funny, I don’t recall our ballots having “incumbent” next to anyone’s name, ror do I recall any voters being forced into anything by the odious (in my view) Greene and Eckman. They won fair and square. I don’t like it, but until their opponents put up even a pittance (the “monied” interests all together spent less than $4 per city voter on their campaigns — can no one give up a mediocre latte or two once per election cycle?!?!), they’ll lose, lose, and lose again.
BTW, WTF is up with Chris Telfer winning Senate District 27 so easily? Nothing against Maren Lundgren, but the local Dems are awfully pathetic to not make that one even close.
Bend is still a Red city, it will take years or a toxic spill, or nightmare pollution to get progressives involved. Beaten down by COBA/CORA for too long. As someone who frequently attends city council I can tell you its always 99% builders testifying, in Bend if you ain’t got money in the game, you don’t get involved.
Virtually everyone of Bend’s incumbents have a financial ties to the City Real Estate businesses. The new people will find their personal business expand. Bend is not about community, but about personal gain.
I can think a time 10+ years ago when there were people who cared about the community, they put their time in. Things now will get real bad. Note that Palin-McCain carried the election, Bend is still Red.
Yes, the Blue Folk need to find hip candidates that reasonate with the young. Virtually nobody cares. City Hall is out of touch with the youth, and they don’t care. COBA,COBA,CORA do what they wish, all funded by the taxpayer.
Bend gets the government they deserve, the government is a mirror image of the inhabitants. Self absorbed parasites.